‘100 Deadly Skills, Survival Edition’: How to survive a bear attack

In his new book, “100 Deadly Skills, Survival Edition,” former Navy SEAL Clint Emerson covers surviving a bear attack as one of the skills. Encountering a bear may seem like a distant possibility to most, even active outdoorsmen. We rarely hear about bear attacks and even more rare is hearing from those that survive bear attacks.

Here is an excerpt from what Clint recommends you do in the event you come face to face with a deadly bear.

If the bear charges you, this is the moment to use bear spray or shoot. Dispense bear spray when the bear is within forty feet, or aim rifle sights at a spot below its chin, or just behind its front legs if shooting broadside. If you are unarmed, stand very still. The bear may be doing a false charge to test your mettle as a potential predator, and could lose interest once it sees that you are not a threat. If the bear attacks, most experts agree that this is the moment to lie down and play dead. You want to convince the bear that it has done its job and effectively minimized the perceived threat you posed. Lay flat on your stomach to protect your organs, crossing your hands behind your neck to guard your arteries. Or curl into the fetal position, covering the back of your neck with your hands. Playing dead is an effective strategy with a 75 percent success rate; because most bear attacks are defensive in nature, bears will back down once they recognize that you are not a threat. Of course, nothing is predictable in the wild. Bears, though omnivorous, subsist mostly on plants and fish—but they have been known to feast on human flesh.

Never turn your back on a bear, and never try to run. Both of these actions can kick-start a bear’s predatory reflexes—and you’ll never be able to outrun a bear, as the animals can travel at up to thirty miles per hour. Instead, slowly walk away sideways, keeping an eye on the animal so that you can monitor its movements.

If playing dead does not cause the bear to lose interest, you are the rare victim of a predatory attack. The bear intends to kill and possibly eat you, so fight back with any available weapons—a knife, sticks, rocks, your fists. Aim for the eyes and nose, where the bear is most sensitive.

There’s no tried-and-true, written-in-stone protocol for handling a bear attack, in part because attacks are so rare. So it’s no surprise to find debate among bear-country dwellers about how to handle a grizzly charge versus an encounter with a black bear. Some say that playing dead is more likely to work with the former, claiming that the latter’s less frequent attacks are more likely to be offensive. But all agree that pepper spray is the single best deterrent, one so effective that it has been used successfully by children under the age of ten.

Just this week we have seen a guy who survived a bear attack. He utilized some of the skills that Clint Emerson has highlighted in his new book such as using bear spray and playing dead. Even though he still got torn up pretty bad, because he was prepared and reacted in the proper way, he can live to tell about it. This is a real life example of one of Clint Emerson’s skills put to use.

For more skills like this pre-order your copy of 100 Deadly Skills Survival Edition on Amazon.

Comments

To comment on this article please join/login.
Here's a sample of the comments on this post.

triz

Haha

triz

Wow I just was reading thru the bs below or above depending on how many likes this comment gets and wow so much bickering and banter.. talking about theoreticals and what not? Discrediting Clint? Low blow? Maybe theres alternative methods but these seem to be proven to work well.. and all that stuff about people being shaky when operating a weapon ... do you know what site your on?

Jerry Sullivan

Never carried bear spray in my life carl, but I do suggest that people SHOULD do so. Unlike most, I have extensive weapons handling skills, grew up in the woods, have a well developed sense of situational awareness wherever I work or live and have seen the elephant on SEVERAL occasions. I've never alarmed or interfered with the beasts activities and stayed away from trolling in Natl Parks. But I have been well within talking distance, prepared to do the deed.. and several times within contact distance where bi-pedal critters were the issue... I think YOU are the only one insulted by good advice based on extensive life experience. There is no guarantee that one will survive a close encounter with an apex predator in the wild, so one should take the best approach to resolve the situation and hopefully not have to kill Mr Predator or be eaten in the process. Wish I had it to do all over again...

Jerry Sullivan

I have joesig.. as well as other human and non human predators on a few continents..thanks for the kind words....

LPD256

All I can say after reading all the comments is wow.......and I'm wondering if it's true that grizzly poop has those little bells you put on shoes to scare them away in it.